


hop and dance around again

by liamgowl



Series: Choices [1]
Category: It Lives (Visual Novels)
Genre: Gen, I don't know what's happening, Male Main Character, Minor Injuries, Rehabilitation, rated for language
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-13
Updated: 2019-03-13
Packaged: 2019-11-17 13:19:46
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,290
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18099293
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/liamgowl/pseuds/liamgowl
Summary: UnknownI know what happened back then.UnknownIf you want to know where did these two go, come into the woods, right back at the house.UnknownThe only condition is that only you six would go. No cops. No uninvited friends of yours.UnknownAt 2 a.m. be there.





	hop and dance around again

It’s late evening when Lily finally checks her phone, hands still slightly shaking from excitement. She’s finally moving in with her girlfriend Carol! She haven’t really told anyone about it, only admitting that she’d like to the last time everyone was meeting up at their favorite café. Stacy and Andy wished her good luck and cheered her, while Ava in her style wished her luck too. Lucas gave her a few advices, but was also supportive. Lily still couldn’t believe that their friend group stayed through everything together, having each others backs.

 

Well, part of their group stayed together. After their last game in the woods, Noah and Liam just… vanished. They’ve tried to search for them both for nearly a year, up until the only thing left from them was Noah’s shredded jacket and Liam’s blood on it.

 

Ava raised an option that one of them was took by spirit entity from the woods and killed the other. Everyone silently agreed that Liam was gone forever because of Noah. That topic was never raised again, despite the hurt look in Lucas’s eyes whenever he heard the name of his _ex-_ boyfriend.

 

Lily already had packed a box with her stuff even before Carol agreed to move in together, as she never wore these clothes or it didn't fit her anymore, and Dan had a great idea to donate them.

 

When she opened the group chat, though, her mood dropped down instantly. There were a few messages from unknown number.

 

**_Unknown_ **

_Woods..._

 

**_Unknown_ **

_Familiar with them, eh?_

 

**_Unknown_ **

_I know what happened back then._

 

**_Unknown_ **

_If you want to know where did these two go, come into the woods, right back at the house._

 

**_Unknown_ **

_The only condition is that only you six would go. No cops. No uninvited friends of yours._

 

**_Unknown_ **

_At 2 a.m. be there._

 

**_Andy_ **

_who the fuck was that???_

 

**_Dan_ **

_oh no_

 

**_Ava_ **

_idk about you guys but i’m coming_

 

**_Lily_ **

_Guys no! What if it’s a trap?_

 

**_Lucas_ **

_If they say I can see Liam again…_

 

**_Dan_ **

_i still can’t bring myself to go into the woods_

 

**_Andy_ **

_oh what the hell I’m going, just to beat their asses if they’re lying_

 

**_Stacy_ **

_same_

 

**_Lily_ **

_Guys!!!_

 

**_Ava_ **

_c’mon, lily, dan, we’ll stick together_

 

**_Andy_ **

_yeah! i’ll fuck ‘em up_

 

**_Dan_ **

_i guess it won’t be that terrible with all of you_

 

**_Lucas_ **

_Lily, please go with us, I couldn’t be a voice of reason in this situation_

 

**_Lily_ **

_Okay…_

 

**_Ava_ **

_hell yeah squad assemble_

 

**_Dan_ **

_so when are we going? tonight?.._

 

**_Stacy_ **

_the sooner the better_

 

**_Lucas_ **

_Alright, let’s meet near our café before going there_

 

**_Ava_ **

_sounds like a plan_

 

Lily sighed. It seems neither of them would get a good night’s sleep today, and if everything goes terribly wrong — they won’t sleep for nights straight.

As expected, Andy came with a metal baseball bat and a pocket knife and in incredibly determined mood, as well as Ava and Lucas. They decided to form a formation for their group, Andy in the front with Lucas, with Ava and Stacy beside Lily and Dan. Ava had a machete (when did she get that?), and Stacy had a gun she got last year for safety measures. Lucas had a monstrosity he mistook for flashlight, with it beaming brightly through shadows and it seemed heavy.

It’s 1:56 A.M when they arrive at the house, not actually entering it. Andy shouts something along the lines of “Come out, you fucker, we’re here!”, but Lily’s heart pounding in her chest loudly prevents her from actually hearing it. Dan, who’s been silent since they stepped into the woods, whimpered, while Stacy tried to calm him (and herself) down. There was no noise coming from the house, except the wind twirling into the broken windows. Even from there Lily could see how Lucas’s arm that wasn’t holding a flashlight trembled — she didn’t knew if it was because he was nervous to go back here after two years since the accident or that he was scared the spirit returned again.

After what feels like an hour, a silhouette showed up at the threshold, shaking and swaying slightly. Andy immediately raised his bat, ready to bash their head, whoever that was; Ava and Stacy got into fighting positions — Connor’s been teaching them how to fight a year back, after they’ve discovered that he’s been teaching Liam how to fight. The silhouette stepped into the moon’s light, crashing down on their knees and breathing heavily.

“ _Noah_?!” Stacy shouted in surprise, snapping everyone into motion.

Lucas and Stacy quickly went to help Noah, Andy’s still tense and waiting for Noah to make one wrong move and bash him. Dan relaxed slightly, squatting down and breathing so quickly Lily thought he might pass out. Ava’s body tensed up, ready to bounce. Lily carefully sat with Dan, drawing circles with her palm on his back, trying to calm him down, telling him how to breath.

Everything slightly calmed down after Noah was set on a stump, his bleeding from head and left arm stopped. Ava and Andy were guarding everyone as they crowded around Noah, who looked like he hasn’t slept in a year and went through wringer. He looked at them with shallow eyes, still seemingly dazed after whatever he experienced. Lucas has asked first.

“Was that you who texted us?”

 

That seemed to help Noah snap out of whatever state he was in, his pupils blown wide as he struggles to stand up. Lily helped him to stand straight, and he ran into the house again, leaving his friends ( _?_ ) to call out to him and stare with surprise.

 

“What the fuck, man, _Noah_ , get back!” Ava yelled after him, clearly irritated to see her ex-friend after he lured them in to sacrifice them and vanished, taking with him her best friend.

 

Nonetheless, no one dared to enter this house, not after several months of torture and after years of guilt, that was still present in the group.

 

Noah returns after 10 minutes or so — Andy basically counted them down — but with a body wrapped up in cloth, long brown hair flowing out from the spot where Noah hold them against his chest, no face peeking out to identify them. Noah hurriedly sat up on a stoop again, breathing heavily and pressing body tightly to him, finally relaxing.

 

“Noah?..” Dan was the one who risked to address him.

 

“Yeah, I’m—” he was still breathing like he ran 5 kilometers in 0.05 seconds, “I’m sorry, I tried to— to _fix it_ , but I don’t know h—how it turned out.”

 

Noah unfolded cloth, just barely to show the face of the person he was holding. Everyone froze immediately, staring at the face of a friend they thought they’ve lost two years ago, along with Noah. Lucas choked out a sob, stepping close enough to see a white jagged scar that went from the middle of his right cheek and across his lips, ending abruptly in the middle of his chin. Liam’s skin was sickeningly white, lips blue and chapped almost to the point of bleeding, violet bags under his eyes.

 

“We gotta get you guys to the ER, and quick.”  Andy said, picking Liam up and handing him to Lucas, who looked at him quizzically. “It’s your boyfriend, so you carry him,” he shrugged nonchalantly and helped Noah up on his feet.

 

After a couple of minutes they’ve reached the exit of the woods, practically running to the hospital with now passed out Noah and Liam in their arms.

 

Lily, as well as the rest of her friends, doesn’t get a minute of sleep through the night.

* * *

Noah wakes up at the midday, looking slightly better than Liam, who was still out.

 

“When you guys exorcised Redfield, or some shit,” everyone, even Noah, jerked at the name, “It got to Liam somehow, tried to possess him or something. Well, not possess, just… He acted weirdly and there was smoke around him just like with the fucker. I— I couldn’t leave him. I knew I was enough of a jerk when I went crazy with trying to return Jane.”

 

“No shit, Sherlock.” Stacy mumbled, and was elbowed by Lily for that, Noah only chuckled weakly. “What? It’s true.”

 

“I ran away, trying to find a way to return him to his… previous state. My search was fruitless for a year, up until I’ve met this weird old guy who apparently was in a cult or something. He said him and plenty of people were worshiping those kinds of entities, and for some reason he knew how to perform a ritual to uh— exorcise it? He listed stuff for me to get and words to read, shit like that. I’ve found everything in a span of, I think, 7 months. It took several more months to finally bring Liam back.”

 

Everyone was silent when Noah finished, absorbing it all.

 

“Why didn’t you asked us to help you?” Dan’s voice cracked a little at the end, thick with tears.

 

“It was my mistake to fix.” Noah huffed, looking anywhere but his friends. “Plus like you would’ve believed me.”

 

Dan stays silent.

* * *

Liam wakes up three days after Noah, his skin not as pale as it was before, gray eyes distant and unfocused.

 

“Drawbacks from whatever he went through mentally,” doctor offered to them. “We’ll get him through physical course and antidepressants, hopefully he’ll get back to normal.”

 

On the same day, Liam’s parents arrive. His father Jacob and mother Lisa are crying and talking to him, telling him everything he missed for the past two years he was gone. They tell him how they never stopped believing that their son just vanished, how the house felt suffocating without him, especially when they lived so close to the woods he was lost in. They tell him that Hilda’s still waiting for him to return, Wednesday’s stayed at Ava’s place and Friday at Dan’s. They tell him how they keep seeing some dog-shaped shadow across their yard, playfully lecturing him for attracting near him all of the animals.

 

Liam’s dull eyes stare right through them, but at least he’s somewhat looking at them and it gives them hope that he’ll be okay soon. His friends are trying to stay strong for him, ready for every drawback from the ritual.

 

Lucas is happy to have his boyfriend back, but it mentally drains him seeing him so… quiet, monotone, almost a ghost of the past himself. Lucas is there for Liam, just like when Liam was there for him back in the high school.

 

The first reaction his friends get out of him is when Noah, who was discharged two days after Liam woke up, came along with them. As soon as Noah gets in the zone where Liam could see him, Liam’s eyebrows lift in almost surprised expression. He still doesn’t says anything, but with Noah, he looks straight into his eyes. Their friends look at him with shocked expressions, while Andy’s calling a doc over.

 

Doctor explains Noah might have something with Liam’s traumatic experience. Noah in response to that, looks over with pained expression at Liam, who got back in his state after three minutes of staring at him.

* * *

In span of two months, Liam gets back to the way he was in high school with flying colors. He starts to smile and joke as much as he did, gets excited easily as before, and gets flustered around Lucas as much as he did. His parents were ecstatic to have their child back, shamelessly spoiling him with his favorite sweets and swarming him with affection. His friends are glad to have him back, meeting up even more frequently than they did after he and Noah went missing — they tried to keep themselves together, as if they were glued.

 

Doctor was impressed how quick he recovered, but Noah wasn’t. He said that it was normal, as it was just a drawback.

 

Although, sometimes Liam would just disconnect from everything around him, as if he was back to the state he was in in the hospital. When Lucas first noticed and asked about it, Liam waved it off as flashbacks. When brought up in the group, Noah was genuinely surprised that he remembered all those two years he spent in middle ground between a monster and a human being. He wasn’t supposed to, but Liam waved off his friends’ concern and said that nothing really happens when he was stuck in the woods.

 

Bonus:

 

It’s two weeks and a half into September, — exactly four months after Lucas and Liam got married, — and half of their now usual group is sitting at the tables in café that was opened a few months back. Ava’s sitting between Dan and Andy, casually tapping on her phone, across from her Liam’s telling Tomoichi about the new game he played, occasionally dragging Noah into the conversation. Suddenly, it struck Ava like lightning.

 

“Noah, was it you who texted us to go to the house in the woods the night we’ve found you?”

 

Silence settled between all of them suddenly, Andy and Dan freezing in confusion immediately. Noah arched an eyebrow at her, stopping tapping pen at his notebook.

 

“No? You guys got a text about— How?”

 

“How else we would’ve found you? It wasn’t just like we were taking a stroll through the woods at two a.m.”

 

“Oops,” Liam spoke, awkwardly scratching his neck and smiling. “My bad, that was me. After Noah got out to do something I grabbed his phone and texted you.”

 

“Liam,” Noah seemed a little uneasy, “You wasn’t even conscious when I got out.”

 

 Liam's smile faltered.

**Author's Note:**

> this is for you, mom  
> love you


End file.
